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Weekly news and features for business continuity professionals

Business continuity professionals face a host of unique problems every day. Those who have extensive experience in resilience know that no two situations are the same and preparing for future events can be extremely difficult. Dick Donovan of M&T Bank said his organization has turned to creative problem solving (CPS) as a way to boost their resilience and get more people involved in the business continuity program.

Resource management is something that businesses of all shapes and sizes must deal with on some level almost every day. Regardless of industry, access to resources is among the most critical things in keeping your business running. While it may fall to other areas of the organization, BC pros should still have a hand in, or at least be informed about, how their company manages resources.

Widespread power outages affected the White House, the Capitol, museums, train stations and other sites across Washington and its suburbs Tuesday afternoon — all because of an explosion at a Maryland power station, officials said. Many of the outages were brief, but some were longer and forced evacuations.

California Public Utilities Commission President Michael Picker said he would ask the commission's staff to study "the culture of safety" and the structure of Pacific Gas & Electric Co., which has its gas and electricity operations under a single corporate board and chief executive.

An oil consortium says an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico today can be cleaned up far faster than five years ago when BP's Macondo well blew out off the coast of Louisiana, spawning America's worst offshore oil spill. It took BP and the industry's best containment technology 87 days to contain the deep-water blowout.

The storm that had doused Northern California arrived in Southern California on Tuesday night, bringing mostly light but necessary rainfall across much of the region. Thousands were without power for several hours because of the storm.

A deadly strain of bird flu has reached the Midwest, killing or requiring hundreds of thousands of turkeys to be euthanized. H5N2 is a highly contagious virus that kills commercial poultry quickly once it gets into a barn, but risk to the public is considered low.

The conditions are ripe for a series of storms to gain strength and buffet Middle America over the next two days, with hail and tornadoes possible in parts of the nation's geographic heartland, forecasters warned. Areas that don't see strong storms could see heavy rain instead.

Not all threats to an organization come from outside. Continuity Insights has discussed data breaches, leaks and other issues that began internally and cost companies time and money. Whether they come from a disgruntled employee or an honest mistake, they can be just as dangerous as being targeted by outsiders.

Resource management is a critical concept when it comes to resilience. An organization can’t function properly without the things it needs to do so. While resources are important, there are few that are as universally needed as water. Nathaniel Forbes of Forbes Calamity Prevention argues that the impact of restricted access to water is something more business continuity professionals should focus on.

The downing of Germanwings flight A320 has once again brought aviation disasters into the limelight. While still very rare, plane crashes are attention grabbing because of their scope and scale. Last year saw several incidents that dominated news coverage. Here are five of the worst airline crashes of 2014.

Internet providers lost an Australian court battle to keep secret the names of Internet users suspected of illegally downloading Hollywood movie "Dallas Buyers Club" over file-sharing networks. The Federal Court ruling is a landmark win for copyright holders in a country which has a reputation for being among of world's most prolific Internet pirates.

The profile that has emerged of Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz has become more troubling by the day. In the hours after Flight 9525 crashed in the French Alps two weeks ago, Lubitz was regarded as one of 150 victims in an unexplained disaster. Two days later he was the prime suspect of an unfathomable act.

Separate tropical storms that have swept through parts of Bangladesh have left at least 36 people dead and scores injured. Media reports said that the casualties have been recorded since Saturday and that most deaths took place in the northern district of Bogra.

As California endures a fourth year of drought, Brown's order this week requires towns and cities statewide to draw down water use by 25 percent compared with 2013 levels. While past reductions were voluntary, Brown said he is using his emergency powers to make the cuts mandatory.